


Snow

by orphan_account



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Case Fic, M/M, Pre-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-26
Updated: 2015-10-26
Packaged: 2018-04-28 05:53:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5080222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam finds a snowglobe and what should have been a simple salt and burn starts to get strange.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Snow

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written for the 2015 April Fools Challenge at [spnspiration](http://spnspiration.livejournal.com)

John is tracking a werewolf in Ohio so Dean is the one who gets saddled with the salt and burn several hundred miles northwest, in lower Minnesota. Sam chooses to go with Dean, and no one ought to be surprised about this if they’d just think for two seconds about the argument that happened a few days ago.

“Yeah, but dad’ll need the extra hands more than I will,” Dean says again. He still exercises the theory that telling Sam the same thing enough times will make Sam believe him. “I can do salt and burns in my sleep.”

“Dad wasn’t too cut up about it,” Sam says. He’s folded into the passenger seat with a book open in his lap and picking at a zit scab right over his cheekbone. He scrutinizes the gray, frost-caked suburbs they’re passing through before he adds, “I think the werewolf is bogus.”

“What?” Dean taps the brakes for a stop sign. A tan Civic crosses the intersection in front of them. The driver’s gender is indeterminate from the low hat and massive scarf. The car’s lower half is thick with packed, black snow and rock salt residue. Dean lets the Impala growl forward again. “Why you say that?” he asks.

Sam shrugs. “Dad seemed off,” he says.

“So you think—“

“The demon, yeah.”

Dean passes another block in silence. It kills him sometimes how attuned Sam is to how dad thinks. Dean might consider being jealous over it, but really, sheer similarity probably causes half the scuffles those two get into. That brings up the prospect of a solid few days’ peace, and that makes Dean outright grin at the road scudzy with slush.

“What?” Sam asks.

“Nothing.”

Sam considers his brother for another moment then leans across the bench seat and pushes his lips into the corner of Dean’s mouth.

“That?” Sam asks.

“Sure.”

Dean glances over, but Sam has already retreated to his side of the seat and is examining the threadbare jeans fabric stretching over his knees like he's shy or something. Sam could use another pair of jeans, Dean thinks. Hell, they’re here by themselves for at least three or four days; it’s practically vacation. They can indulge.

***

The town is decently sized, enough so that Dean doesn’t think they’ll draw undue attention. That’s the pain in the ass with the dinky farm towns in the middle of nowhere; you show up in a muscle car and everyone knows about it. Here, people look like they mind their own business more.

“Where’s the ghost haunting?” Sam asks as they drive down the town’s main street.

Right. The hunt. Dean’s still caught up on jeans and no fighting.

“Um, a bunch of people have been attacked in a house that’s since been foreclosed,” Dean says. He leans forward to find the street names. “Pretty standard house haunting. Like I said, I could do this in my sleep.”

“Yeah, so let’s get it out of the way.” Sam slouches forward and watches a pack of what look like high school students on the sidewalk. He cranes his neck to keep them in sight as the Impala growls past them. Jesus Christ. See, this is what happens every time dad yanks Sam out of school. Sam gets passive aggressive, staring at people his age like he’s trying to yell, ‘Look, they have such normal lives. Why can’t we do that?’ Doesn’t even matter how many times Dean or dad trot out the same answer.

They leave the downtown area behind them and wind their way through more neat suburbs. They find the house down a short, 15 mph road, surrounded by a yellow lawn and rotten snow.

They park on the curb and climb out of the car. Sam stretches his whippet body while Dean rounds to the trunk and fetches equipment. Dean angles his head to keep Sam in his view. Sam maintains the stretch for longer than he needs to and arches his back at the last minute to let a thick slice of pale brown waist show. Dean almost laughs at the clumsy artlessness of the ploy. It works, though, and that’s the kicker.

“C’mon,” Dean says when he passes Sam on the way to the house. He slaps Sam’s ass at the last minute, and Sam lets out a small yelp. The next second, Dean gets an elbow in the ribs.

It’s so strange, because they flirt exactly like the brothers that they are. Half puppy-roughhousing and half loose-handed groping that wouldn’t be misplaced between a pair of freshmen trying to figure out how mouths slot together. They’re a fucking mess, and nothing about this is sensible or smart, but here’s them breaking into a foreclosed, haunted house, giving each other this look that says they’re not going to bother picking up the EMF meter for a while.

They breeze through the house’s lock and set up a massive circle of salt on the living room carpet and it turns out they don’t pick up the EMF meter for a whole two hours.

***

Sam wanders off in search of the bathroom first, stark naked and with a steel pipe in one hand. Dean yells that Sam’s going to die on the toilet. Sam ignores him, and five minutes later, Dean hears a flush. Sam reappears with the steel pipe and something new in his other hand.

Dean is struggling into his jeans and t-shirt. He wonders whether it’s worth climbing into a shower that will have no hot water, just to clean the spunk off.

“You see it at all?” Dean asks. “Flickering lights?”

“No.” Sam settles into the salt circle again. He holds up something white. “Look.”

A snow globe. Dean squints at it, at the little brown porcelain house amid a wide, white field. Sam tilts the globe, and it starts to snow gold glitter.

“Okay?” Dean moves to his knees and zips up his jeans. “Get dressed, Sam, let’s get this over with.”

Sam tilts the snow globe one more time, then stands and gathers up his clothes.

***

They move through the house methodically, salt bombs and steel pipes in a ready stance. Dean can feel Sam’s hot breath on the back of his neck; he wonders whether Sam is doing it on purpose.

“Maybe it’s hiding,” Sam suggests a half hour later, when they’ve circled back to the living room without the EMFmeter making so much as a splutter. “Maybe it’s only active at night.”

Dean putters his lips and glances to the window where the dull winter light is only growing dimmer.

“Okay,” he agrees. “We’ll stake it out and see what shows up. Let’s grab something to eat and come back.”

They leave the salt circle intact and step into a brisk wind. Snow is falling in fat clumps from an iron-gray sky. Dean hopes that it won’t pile up too badly as he tosses the equipment back into the trunk. The Impala can get questionable in too much snow.

They head back toward the downtown area. Dean remembers seeing a smattering of bars, and he decides that he’ll sneak Sam into all of them tomorrow night. Sam’s great when he’s tipsy.

The snow grows thicker, and Dean turns on the windshield wipers with a mutter. Beside him, Sam flips through the book he was reading on the way in here. Dean hasn’t asked after the title yet.

“Think dad’s okay?” Dean asks rhetorically. Sam shrugs.

“He’ll call us sometime tonight,” he says.

Dean slows for a stop sign. The snow is abating; probably just a flurry.

“Still kind of wish you’d gone with him,” he says. “Werewolves can be a handful.” He can already hear Sam’s rebuttal.

“If you’d think for two seconds about that argument a few days ago.”

“Yeah, but dad’ll need the extra hands more than I will,” Dean says again. He still exercises the theory that telling Sam the same thing enough times will make Sam believe him. “I can do salt and burns in my sleep.”

Sam is picking at the scab on his cheekbone. Dean nearly tells him to cut it out, because he’s been fussing at it all day. They come to an intersection, and Dean taps the brakes for a tan Civic that crosses the intersection in front of them. The woman inside wears a low hat and massive scarf. The car’s lower half is thick with packed, black snow and rock salt residue. Dean lets the Impala growl forward again. “Why you say that?” he asks.

He pauses.

“Say what?” Sam asks.

“Nothing.” Dean revs the Impala forward and thinks about how Sam is so much like dad.

Cue Sam leaning across the console to brush a kiss against Dean.

Cue the plan to steal jeans at the local Wal-Mart. It’s practically vacation. They can indulge.

***

“Check it out,” Sam says. He holds out the snow globe, and Dean leans forward to peer at the brown, porcelain house and the two tiny figures beside it.

“Where’s you find it?” Dean asks. He lets his clothes hang limp in his hands as he stares at the snow globe.

“On a shelf,” Sam says. “In the hall.” He tilts the globe, and glitter sifts across the miniature scene. Dean’s eyes are drawn to the window. Fat clumps of snow make business-like descents past the glass.

Dean finishes zipping on his jeans. He stands and says that they should start looking for this ghost.

***

The Honda civic is spattered with rock salt residue and rotten snow.

“Dean,” Sam says. Dean glances at him with a sharp inhale, then sends the Impala forward again. Sam tries to kiss him, but Dean is too distracted to appreciate it.

Sam stares at high school students. They find the house. Dean watches Sam’s strip of skin and slaps his ass. They sanctify the abandoned, haunted house in only the way a pair of kids like them can. Sam walks to the bathroom naked with his steel pole. When he comes back, he makes it snow.

***

“Dad wasn’t too cut up about it,” Sam says. He’s folded into the passenger seat with a book open in his lap and picking at a zit scab right over his cheekbone. He scrutinizes the gray, frost-caked suburbs they’re passing through before he adds, “I think the werewolf is bogus.”

Dean has a knuckle-tight grip on the steering wheel and he can’t figure out why. The intersection approaches them, and the stop sign is a dulled red beneath the grunge of winter. Dean glances over at Sam, who is rereading the book he’s had in his lap since—

Dean faces forward again and is startled when he expects to see fat clumps of snow. Fat white bits and gold glitter around a porcelain house and two tiny shapes.

Dean inhales so sharply that his nostrils hurt. In the same moment, he throws one arm across Sam’s chest and slams down on the accelerator. The Honda civic has no chance to avoid them, and the last thing Dean sees before the impact is the car’s caked black snow and rock salt grime.


End file.
